June, 2010. Such a different world it seems.
San Francisco, as seen from near the shore in Berkeley. A couple of careers ago, almost twelve years, a vastly different zeitgeist ago.
That project, that company, that career, that world, all gone. And yet not gone, all now just a little piece of the whole that makes up today’s puzzle.
No matter how much we want to know why, some days we just have to keep moving without an answer. Days like today.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Photography, Travel
I lesson I’ve learned but need to remember and use in times of need has to do with being “stuck.”
Let’s say things aren’t working, or at least, not working well.
Something needs to change, but you’re not sure what.
You’re caught up in the “fog of war,” so to speak.
You’re concerned that you could do the wrong thing and make things worse.
So, you do nothing, which in and of itself could well be making things worse.
What to do?
Move.
Maybe you’re not moving in the ideal direction.
There’s a potential for you to be moving in the worst possible direction.
But if you do a quick gut check, think about what you know and don’t know, and make your best possible decision, the odds are it will be at least somewhat better.
And even if it’s not fantastic, even if it is worse, you can see that from a different perspective and correct course.
Triangulate. Get new data.
Change the variables.
Flip the problem on its head.
Get some tiny part of the puzzle taken care of and set aside, see what new avenues that opens up.
It’s like playing a game where every move affects all other potential moves.
Somewhere in there is a solution, a path.
But if you can’t see that path now, MOVE!
Find a different perspective, the view that will show you the next part of the maze.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Paul, Photography
An open list of suggestions to the MLB Players Association and owners, who are currently involved in a months-long pissing contest which is delaying the opening of spring training camps and threatens to very soon delay or eliminate a chunk of the regular season —
As I said above – READ THE ROOM!!! In case it might not be obvious to all of you chuckleheads, we, the American and baseball-loving public, are ***NOT*** in the mood for your shit right now.
Given all of this, we’re exhausted, frustrated, and furious. We need a break. We were really looking forward to going to the park, sitting in the bleachers, having a beverage and a couple of hot dogs, and catching a game.
But again, it’s the greedy billionaires vs the greedy millionaires, debating once again which group is the most clueless and selfish.
Guess what, guys? WE DON’T CARE ABOUT THE DETAILS. We really and truly don’t.
But we’re going to care a LOT for completely different reasons if you don’t pull your heads out the bodily orifices where you’ve stuck them. If we don’t actually have baseball to go to in April, if we don’t have a way to shut out all of the things above for a couple of hours, if you can’t see common sense and compromise, we’re all going to be mightily pissed off.
We’re not going to be pissed off at the players. We’re not going to be pissed off at the owners. We’re going to be pissed off at ***ALL*** of you.
You think you’ll get by because you have massive TV and radio contracts… which are worthless if you’re not playing games. You have massive naming rights on your stadiums… which are worthless if no one’s in the stands.
Consider also all of those who rely on you for jobs at your stadiums, parking, office staff, and all of the tens of thousands of suppliers and merchants near your stadiums. Bars, restaurants, and so on.
It’s been one thing when you’ve pulled this stunt before, in relatively good times. We got by, although your finances and attendance and popularity always took a hit.
No worries! The fans will always come back! Right?
But these aren’t good times, relatively or not. Things sort of suck right now. We need a pick me up, we need a break – and you’re going to pile on just to prove that you can be more petty and shortsighted than the other guys?
Think very, very carefully about that decision. Take a look at what’s going on in Ukraine and ponder how badly Putin has miscalculated. Your decisions are inconsequential compared to Putin’s mistakes, but for those who love the game, who need the game, and whose livelihoods depend on the game, they’re non-trivial.
Don’t screw up.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Freakin' Idiots!, LA Angels, Paul
Lots of twos today. “Tues”day. 02-22-2022. Celebrating, or at least noting the occurrence, at 10:22 PM, or 22:22 02-22-2022 if you’re on military time. I think that I missed precisely 22:22:22 02-22-2022 exactly for a whole new level of obsessive-compulsive behavior.
We humans do love our numerology and symbolism. Especially when it means NOTHING.
Days are well defined whether we’re here or not. The year is a fact, or at least can be defined for any body orbiting a central star. It’s just Newtonian celestial mechanics.
It’s that zero point, that starting point that’s tricky. Year zero, month zero, day zero, hour zero, minute zero, second zero is when? And how do you know? Hell, 2/3 of your units are 100% arbitrary!
But we’ll ignore that when someone finds “prophecies” in a document thousands of years old, totally made up, 100% fiction, translated from one language to another to a third to another… And based on that we’ll calculate to seventeen decimal places when the end of the world will be, or when a god will return, or when the alien mothership will show up in our skies to take only the select few home to Valhalla. Or something like that.
It’s a matter of hoping we have a shred of control or order in a Universe which has very little order and over which we have very, very little control. So is it better to believe nonsense and feel better, or to face the cold, hard truth and feel like shit?
Tough call.
I’m going to go with acknowledging the ridiculous, use it as an excuse for some joy (although, damn it, today was also National Margarita Day and I didn’t celebrate or observe the holiday!) because we all know there are too few reasons for joy, and avoid letting anyone pick your pocket or mistake your celebration for gullibility. If someone tells you that their precise to seventeen decimal places calculation means you should give them all of your life savings, maybe skip that round of grape flavored cyanide and have a margarita instead.
Just make it yourself. Just to be sure.
The fact that the deuces were wild today doesn’t mean that the cosmic slot machine is going to spill out treasure.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Freakin' Idiots!
Sometime in the mid 1960’s, when it was a big freakin’ deal to have a movie shown on TV! It meant either NBC or CBS was showing it in prime time, and I had to finagle permission to stay up past my bedtime. A big hit for me with lots of long-lasting memories was “The Time Machine.” Made by George Pal and starring Rod Taylor and Yvette Mimieux in 1960, the pre-teen Paul was very impressionable and large parts of the movie scared the crap out of me. (It seems I wasn’t alone.)
What really scared me was when the air raid sirens went off and the peaceful, dull, childlike Eloi all went slack jawed and started marching zombie-like into the caves of the Morlocks, where obviously the Morlocks were going to kill them and eat them. We were living in Kansas City at the time (remember, huge Chiefs fan here!) and tornadoes were not uncommon for about six months of each year. When they got close, the air raid sirens went off to warn folks to take cover. Needless to say, the summers after seeing “The Time Machine” had a whole new interpretation of that!
Skip forward fifty-six or fifty-seven years, to 2022. You’re watching television and a Taco Bell commercial comes on:
Aside from the fact that I’m not a fan of Taco Bell’s food, all of these examples remind me constantly of one thing – THE ELOI!!! The protagonists in every one of these ads act exactly like the Eloi in “The Time Machine!”
So, Taco Bell’s advertising agency and marketing gurus, look how you’ve made me think of your food!
I’m about to have the romantic, hormonal, passionate night that I’ve always fantasized about and which I’ll remember for the rest of my life – until I turn into an Eloi and march into the Morlocks’ cave to be killed. And YOU’RE the Morlocks!
I’m a lonely geek who’s suddenly found my soulmate, only to have her snatched away into zombieland just feet away from my embrace. And YOU’RE the zombies!
You get the drift.
Obviously, I’m not the target market for these ads, both because of my tastes in food and because of my age (and probably a half-dozen or more other traits), but jeez louise!! Did NO ONE look at these ads and think, “Wait…maybe…”
Or, worse, did they look at it and think, “Whatever! As long as they spend money at our place!”
Go find a taco truck, or a mom & pop style Mexican place with real food. And hoist a margarita and a burrito to Yvette Mimieux, who passed away at age 80 this afternoon.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Entertainment, Movies, Paul
“Art is never finished, only abandoned.” –
“A poem is never finished, only abandoned.” – Paul Valery
“A work of art is never finished. It is merely abandoned.” – E.M. Forster
“Books are never finished – they are merely abandoned.” – Oscar Wilde
It seems that Valery said it first, in French, but you get the idea.
I would note that the same applies to many, MANY things in life. In my particular case tonight, I note that large, complex business projects often fall into the same category.
Would this have anything to do with the meeting tomorrow, annual budget, December financials, and various other miscellaneous documents?
Mmmm…maybe. Is the Pope Polish?
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Paul
First Monday of the new year.
First Monday back (for most folks, not me) after a bunch of days off of work.
First Monday of a “regular” five-day work week after what was, for most folks, the previous two weeks of three or four-day work weeks, and maybe three of the past six weeks being short.
Still breathing?
Still calm?
Already looking forward desperately to Friday night?
Already holding on for dear life?
It’s okay. You can do this.
You may or may not like it. But you can do this.
And then there’s that, “Oh, shit! I still haven’t {insert panic item here}!!” moment.
GOTO “Still breathing?”
Repeat as necessary.
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Paul
RED!
Love.
Lust.
Anger.
Passion.
Hatred.
Excitement.
Desire.
Frustration. (Maybe. Actually frustration might be more like a faded orange. “Red adjacent,” but missing the urgency, the life, the adrenaline, just keeping the bittersweet memories.)
So many strong emotions, so much energy spent keeping them in check, hidden, safe, not allowing the danger out of control.
A red day…
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Photography
How much of our world is random? How much can be planned for and foreseen?
(Image from RandomOrg app)
How much control can we have and how much do we just think (incorrectly) we have?
Despite all of our best efforts and intentions, how much is every decision just a bet with incomplete information and inaccurate assumptions?
And most importantly, does it matter? Do we just need to push on, doing our best, getting up when we’re knocked down, refusing to give up even when we know the game is random at best, rigged against us at worst, because for all of that it’s still the only game in town?
Yep, one of those deep thought nights. Sorry for being boring and “emo.” Just doing the best I can and pushing on.
But it would be nice every now and then to get a clue that it’s all working and not just a completely random outcome of 13,700,000,000 years of molecular Brownian motion and a handful of laws of physics.
I guess that’s what religion is for, and we all I know I’m not going down THAT road. Been there. Done that. It’s worse.
Filed under Deep Thoughts
As I may have blathered on and on about for the past several weeks, it’s been one of “those” times when I’ve been up to my eyebrows in 24/7/365 (or is it “25/8/366” for these?) deadlines on several fronts. Primarily at work and then at the CAF SoCal hangar and from there all of the other little daily deadlines.
Tonight I finished the fifth and (for now) final of the “super gigantic mega oh God we’re all gonna die!” deadlines. I made them all, but it got me thinking about how some folks need to be more explicit about the exact details of the deadline. You know, for people like me!
One of them at work was quite clear – we have a 17:00 meeting on this day with a number of VIPs and it would be “very bad” if we didn’t have that stack of documents ready.
No sweat! After weeks of work, I printed out the final versions for me and emailed them to others on team a full eight minutes before the meeting started. There may have been some hysterical laughter released at the absurdity of it all.
At the other end of the spectrum, the CAF project had to be done “by end of day 9/20/21.”
There’s a fair amount of wiggle room there in my universe. Business day? Or am I still good at 23:59:55? Pacific time zone or Central? That’s important, gives me a whole three more hours!
That got done tonight at 22:20 PDT, so by my definition, I made it by a full 1:40! If that doesn’t fit in their timetable and they meant 17:00 CDT, well, whose fault is that, huh?
Hopefully I’ll finally sleep well tonight. Mañana, y’all!
Filed under Deep Thoughts, Paul
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